Infant feeding bottles for feeding babies with milk or other liquids (‘baby bottles’) are well-known in the art, as are powdered baby milk preparations for use therewith. In a typical usage operation, the bottle container of the baby bottle is charged with a measured portion of the powdered baby milk preparation taken from a bulk container and a measured amount of water is then added. The teat is then fixed to the bottle container by means of a fixing ring, and the now sealed bottle is agitated to dissolve the powdered baby milk preparation. It is known to be important to accurately measure the portion of powdered baby milk preparation to ensure correct concentration and consistency of the baby milk for feeding of the baby. Various simple measuring devices (e.g. spoon-like measures) have been proposed for measuring the powder from the bulk container and transferring it to the baby bottle container.
A baby may require six to eight feeds a day, and to save time, parents or carers often make up several baby bottles in one go. Thus, several operations of measuring the powdered baby milk preparation from the bulk container to each of several baby bottles are conducted in one go. Each baby bottle may then be loaded with water to make up the liquid baby milk as above, or some of the bottles may simply be left charged with the measure of baby milk preparation and ready for later addition of water. The latter operation is preferable from a freshness standpoint in that the baby milk may then be made up (i.e. by adding water) just before feeding it to the baby. A problem associated with both of the above ‘multi-bottle’ powder pre-loading operations is that of course, multiple baby bottles are required. Where the parent and child are ‘out and about’ this can be particularly inconvenient in that the baby bottles are bulky to pack.
In solution to the above problem, there have been proposed baby milk powder dispensers that are arranged to be loaded with multiple pre-measured portions of powdered baby milk preparation. Thus, simple lidded containers comprising multiple (e.g. three or four) compartments have been proposed. In use, each compartment is pre-loaded with a measured portion of powdered milk preparation, and then at feeding time one such portion is removed (e.g. by spooning out) from one compartment to be loaded into the baby feeding bottle. Applicant has now realized that a problem with such simple, multi-compartment lidded containers is that they do not readily facilitate the dispensing of the desired single measured portion into the baby feeding bottle.
In solution to this problem, Applicant has now devised the dispenser provided herein, which provides ease of loading and separate storage of plural measured powder portions and also ease of one portion at a time dispensing of each portion such as to load a baby bottle. The dispenser herein is further arranged to be relatively compact such as to make it convenient for carrying in the bag or indeed, coat pocket of a parent or carer.